CPU Scaling artikel

here has been a lot of confusion about something called the CPU scaling of graphics chipsets. Basically what this scaling thing is all about is the increase in framerate which you get with a certain chipset when you move to a faster CPU. So when a given chipset shows much better performance on a Pentium II 400 than on a 233, then we say that it scales up well... Chipsets that don't seem to benefit much from a faster CPU are said not to scale well. So what's the confusion?

The confusion is about the way graphics cards are tested. Most hardware reviewers (including me) generally test hardware on the fasted CPU they can get their hands on. But when two cards perform about equal on a high end CPU, then that certainly doesn't have to mean that they will be equally close on a slower CPU.. One might scale down very well, while the other doesn't...

There has been a lot scaling-talk about the nVidia Riva TNT chipset and the Banshee chipset from 3Dfx. The Banshee chipset was supposed to perform better on slower CPU's while TNT would be the choice for high-end systems..

I decided to have a look at a number of cards with the popular chipsets we have today, and test them all on various CPU speeds to compare their scaling..